Jon, List,
 
To your point 2.: I think, a sign is a triadic relation, so a Y is ok, but it is a very special kind of triadic relation. I think:
 
-"S mediates between O and I" is too general, because it does not show that there is a difference between O and I.
 
-"S represents O to I" is wrong, I think, because in that case "I" would be the interpreter, not the interpretant. I propose:
 
-"S represents O as I".
 
Best, Helmut
 
 21. August 2018 um 21:09 Uhr
 "Jon Alan Schmidt" <[email protected]>
wrote:
Edwina, Mike, List:
 
1.  Mindful of (and agreeing with) Gary R.'s request for at least a temporary moratorium on this topic, I hesitated to respond; but I decided to try clarifying my position once more, since there has been some evident misunderstanding of it.  The referenced paper and subsequent discussion are about brain activity, which is always actual, so characterizing it as action is not problematic from a Peircean perspective.  Moreover, it falls under the (idioscopic) Special Science of neurophysiology, rather than (cenoscopic) Phaneroscopy, Normative Science, or Metaphysics.  It is primarily within the latter fields that I believe carefully distinguishing the Categories from each other is especially important.
 
2.  Again, as far as I know, Peirce never proposed "the triadic spokes or Y shape" as a representation of the Sign itself; only as a representation of a triadic relation, such as the one that the Sign has with its Object and Interpretant.  I share the concern about properly capturing the mediation aspect of semiosis, but I do not see how a Y is any better than a triangle from that standpoint.
 
3.  I am also uncomfortable with characterizing the Sign as a "function" that transforms "input" (Object) into "output" (Interpretant).  For one thing, this has a deterministic connotation--in mathematics, even non-linear functions always produce the same output upon receiving the same input.  In any case, Peirce's own description was instead that the Sign communicates a Form from the Object to the Interpretant, in such a way that the Object is unaffected by the Sign and the Sign is unaffected by the Interpretant (cf. EP 2:544n22; 1906).
 
Regards,
 
Jon Alan Schmidt - Olathe, Kansas, USA
Professional Engineer, Amateur Philosopher, Lutheran Layman
 
On Mon, Aug 20, 2018 at 8:07 AM, Edwina Taborsky <[email protected]> wrote:

John, Mike, list

1] John - thanks for the clarification of your slide #9, Cognitive Learning.

 I mistook the three slides showing brain activity to refer to the Peircean categories - and was puzzled, since Feeling/Firstness does not, according to Peirce, require a brain. As he said, 'protoplasm' feels...and this is a non-conscious, i.e., non-mental experience. My error regarding your slides.

2] With regard to your slide #4 of machine learning - I've got two points.

I can see, actually, that the triangle is an accurate image in ML, - and comment that such linearity is a key problem in ML. That's why I prefer the triadic spokes or Y shape provided by Peirce for the semiosic Sign because it rejects the linear force - which can be quite overpowering like an avalanche - and enables mediation...which is never linear. Machines have trouble with mediation!

I don't see, as does Mike, that this is related to the categories, but could be wrong, and would also appreciate your clarification.

3] At any rate, I've suggested years ago, that the semiosic triadic act is a function: f{x]=y, where 'f' is mediation. Your slide 5 shows this quite well, AND, in addition, shows the vital nature of this mediation or 'hidden layer'. What is interesting is that your hidden layer[s] is complex/multiple. My view is that this is why Thirdness has three modes: 3-3, 3-2, 3-1 - to provide complexity of organization/transformation of input to output.

My paper, presented in Dubois' conference on Computing Anticipatory Systems,  examines the complex actions of this mediation within the three modes of Thirdness and as a function...and even, puts these actions on a different spatial and temporal zone than the actions of 1ns,2ns.

Note - I've tried to attach my paper, The Sign as a WFF/well-formed formula, but this new computer doesn't have all my papers and I'm an idiot dealing with computers.

Edwina 

On Sun 19/08/18 11:08 PM , Mike Bergman [email protected] sent:

Hi John, List,

I appreciate you keep trying to get us back on target with your comments.

I think the reference Edwina brought forward is the best I've seen so
far for these arguments with respect to the neurophysiology of Thirdness
mediation. Do you agree?

I think I understand your points on slides 7-11 of your short version
http://jfsowa.com/talks/vrshort.pdf.

However, what stopped me in this deck is slide #4. Framing the ML
methods into the triadic triangle format you prefer (as do I) seems to
imply you are relating these ML methods to the universal categories. Is
that your intent? If so, I'd love to hear the rationale behind that.

Best, Mike

On 8/19/2018 8:56 PM, John F Sowa wrote:
> On 8/18/2018 5:41 PM, Edwina Taborsky wrote:
>> I can see from the images that you refer to each of these Peircean
>> categories taking place in a different part of the brain.
>
> That's not what I meant.  The categories are correlated with the
> interconnections of different areas.
>
> For further explanation, I'll have to refer to several diagrams.
> Instead of the 117-slide long version, please download the 21-slide
> short version: http://jfsowa.com/talks/vrshort.pdf
>
> Slide 7 asks "What is cognition?" and summarizes the answer by
> the psychologist Lawrence Barsalou.  That is useful background.
> After that, slides 8 to 11 discuss the experiment of teaching
> 14 students about the workings of four devices:  bathroom scale,
> fire extinguisher, disk brake system, and trumpet.  At different
> stages of learning, they asked the students questions about those
> four devices and recorded the fMRI scans of their brains while
> they were answering.
>
> Instead of showing the scans of the left sides of their brains
> (which are dominated by the language processing), they showed the
> scans of the right sides (which are dominated by the processes of
> imagining and interpreting the images).
>
> All 14 students had similar brain activations for the same 3 kinds
> of questions about the 4 different devices.  It's significant that
> all 168 patterns (14 x 3 x 4) were remarkably similar.
>
> For my summary of the study, please review slides 8 and 9.
> For the full article, the link is at the bottom of slide 8.
>
> Then slide 10 summarizes issues about Intentionality, which is
> the most characteristic aspect of Thirdness.  It quotes Brentano
> and Lynn Margulis before summarizing Peirce's views.
>
> Finally, slide 11 relates the brain scans to 1ns, 2ns, and 3ns.
> Following are three quotations from that slide, each followed
> by my further commentary:
>
>  1. "Perception is based on localized percepts or prototypes. It
>     classifies phenomena by the monadic predicates of Firstness
>     (fMRI image #1)."
>
>     What is critical here is not which part of the brain lights up,
>     but the fact that only one very narrow area is active.  In this
>     case, its the visual cortex, which is active in both direct
>     perception and in mental imagery of remembered or anticipated
>     scenes.  Auditory or tactile perception would be localized in
>     different, but equally narrow areas.
>
>  2. "Long-distance connections in the parietal lobes support dyadic
>     relations that connect all sensory and motor modalities.  They
>     represent the structures of Secondness (image #2)."
>
>     By long-distance, I mean crossing from one lobe to another.
>     In image #2, the visual cortex is still active, but there is
>     more activation in related areas, especially the parietal lobes,
>     which  relate the visual aspects various to kinds of patterns.
>     The tactile and motor areas are also active.  This kind of
>     activity would be characteristic of dyadic relations that
>     relate structural aspects of the four devices.
>
>  3. "The frontal lobes process the mediating Thirdness in reasoning,
>     planning, causality, and intentionality (image #3)."
>
>     The frontal lobes, which are the most active, involve the most
>     complex reasoning.  The frontal lobes are also adjacent to the
>     tactile and motor areas that are also involved in reasoning
>     about how the four devices work.
>
> Mike B
>> The full paper without charge [on "Gradual Progression from Sensory
>> to Task-Related Processing in Cerebral Cortex"]
>> http://www.pnas.org/content/pnas/115/30/E7202.full.pdf
>
> This paper is consistent with the one about the four devices.
> Note that image #1 in slide 11 of vrshort.pdf would be the first
> area to become active when someone is looking at the device.
> Then images #2 and #3 would become active when thinking about
> tasks that use the device.
>
> John
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